The state of the state

The state of the State

By MARGARET S. KNOEPFLE

The
sun
in
our
energy
future

OF ALL the forms of alternative energy, solar is the most appealing. Like coal, sunshine is plentiful. Like nuclear, it is renewable. And unlike either one, it is safe. It is also accessible to ordinary people as well as multinational corporations. It also holds the promise of providing many long-lasting, meaningful jobs that could renew neighborhoods and cities, not to mention individual lives. "Solar," said Jim Hartley of the Northern Illinois Solar Energy Association in an interview last June, "has all positive social dimensions." There is very little around today about which the same can be said.

But will solar work? Leaving aside solar-derived fuels (methane and ethanol from crops and organic waste) or solar-generated electricity (from wind, water and photo voltaic cells), can on-site solar systems help heat 2.5 million homes by 1985? Can commercial and residential solar heating provide the equivalent of 3.5 million barrels of oil per day by the year 2000? These are the goals set by President Carter in his 1979 energy plan. Right now we are both very far away and yet tantalizingly close.

There is, however, at least one authority who says we can reach Carter's energy goal for solar heating. Energy Future: A Report of the Energy Project of the Harvard Business School (edited by Robert Stobaugh and Daniel Yergin) does not, like Barry Commoner's Politics of Energy, completely reject nuclear power. But Energy Future does argue that conservation and solar energy are the surest, quickest and least disruptive means of reducing our dependence on foreign oil in the near future.

According to Energy Future, the high cost of conventionally produced energy will provide some of the impetus for change. Recent history bears this out. As heating costs have gone up, industries have conserved energy. Cities and individuals have done the same, especially in response to emergencies like the 1974 oil shortage in Los Angeles. The nation's list of manufacturers of solar equipment has grown too as a result of shortages and high costs of other fuels: from 47 in 1974 to nearly 297 in 1978 with total annual sales of about $200 million. And it appears the solar industry's network of designers, consultants, installers, appropriate technology advocates and do-it-yourselfers is finally beginning to be taken seriously.

Right now, conservation measures like insulation, storm windows and heat pumps are the best investment consumers can get on their energy dollars. They are also the first step toward solar. Passive solar design, which captures the sun's heat without the use of collectors, is also feasible. It does not add much to the cost of a new house, and solar greenhouses, either passive or fitted with fans and thermostats, can be added to existing houses fairly cheaply.

Active solar systems are more complicated. They involve collectors, pipes, heat pumps and storage systems. A typical active solar hot water heater costs from $ 1,500 to $2,400 installed and is competitive with electric heat in many parts of the country and with oil in some areas. But an active solar system designed to provide 50 percent or more of a house's heating requirements can cost from $15,000 to $19,000 or more, according to State Government News (June 1979). Most consumers can't deal with such high installation costs and are uncertain that solar will work.

And there are problems. Solar technology is easy to understand and accessible, but it requires real attention to details in both design and installation. (A solar greenhouse that is not properly insulated becomes a refrigerator.) We need more good, low-cost solar system designs and more well-trained solar installation technicians. Also many Americans will have to give up their passive habits of pushing up the thermostat and paying later. Both solar heating and conservation require a certain amount of housekeeping and tinkering.

The authors of Energy Future do not believe that the high cost of conventionally produced energy will provide all of the push that solar heating must have to reach Carter's energy goal. They believe the market, as it exists today discriminates against both solar and conservation. Present federal and state tax rebates don't provide enough incentives either — with the exception of California which offers a 55 percent tax rebate on solar systems.

Energy Future recommends: 1) federal subsidies for much of the cost of home and industrial energy conservation; 2) low interest loans to finance solar systems; 3) changes in the nation's building codes to accommodate solar; 4) legislative provision for solar easements; 5) cooperation by the utilities in developing conservation in conjunction with solar heating; 6) changes in the electric rate system so that owners of solar systems will not be penalized, as they are now, by higher rates; 7) an expanded role for utilities not only in providing energy audits to their customers but also in installing insulation and solar systems; 8) investment by the federal government of at least $1 billion in solar research and development with emphasis on on-site heating technologies (for Illinois' program, see November pp. 16-17), and photo-voltaic electric generation (which is on the point of a breakthrough).

Energy Future is a controversial book. Fortune magazine (September 24) is critical of its claims for energy conservation. Time (August 20) says it gives up too quickly on conventional fuels and puts too much faith in both solar and conservation.

But perhaps the biggest challenge posed by Energy Future lies in our nation's substandard and outdated housing. To obtain the solar equivalent of 3.5 million gallons of oil per day (not to mention what we can save on conservation), we must reach millions of American homes and do what we failed to do in the 1960's — fix them up.

2/ December 1979/ Illinois Issues